The country was indeed in a most terrible condition—the Turks threatened it from the south, the Banus of Croatia from the west, and internally the Bogomils were in open revolt and protected by the Duke of St. Sava. The Papal legate managed, however, to bring about a reconciliation between the latter and Stephen Tomašević, who now retired to Jajce. There he collected his magnates around him, and was solemnly crowned, being the first and last Bosnian king who was crowned with the favour of the Catholic Church,[408] styling himself “King of Servia, Hlum, the Littoral, Dalmatia, Croatia, Dolnji-Kralj, the Western Land, Usora, Soli, Prodrinje,” &c. He granted many privileges to the Ragusans, confirmed the Republic in possession of all its territories, and promised to pay his father’s debts towards it.[409] By the end of 1461 he managed to make peace with the Banus of Croatia and his own rebels, and obtained help against the Turks from Venice, Ragusa, and elsewhere. Kosača himself was in danger from the Turks, who only supported him as long as he was of any use to them; he too applied to Ragusa for money and ammunition. Pius II. succeeded after long negotiations in reconciling the King of Hungary and Stephen Tomašević, the latter paying the former a sum of money and giving up a fortress. But in spite of this slightly improved outlook the final ruin was fast approaching. The Bosnian king’s Catholicism had alienated his Bogomil subjects, many of whom had taken refuge among the Turks, while several of the magnates were holding treasonable intercourse with the enemy.
MAP OF THE RAGUSAN REPUBLIC AND NEIGHBOURING STATES.
After the Peace of Carlovitz (1699.)
The Sultan on hearing of Stephen’s alliance with Hungary sent to demand the tribute, and this being refused he vowed vengeance, but stayed his hand for a short while to attend to other affairs. The despairing King implored help of all his neighbours, and prepared for a last stand. More troops were levied in Bosnia, and envoys were sent to Italy and Croatia to enlist mercenaries.[410] But the support of his people was lacking, and resistance hopeless. Ragusa could not give men, being herself hard pressed, but gave arms and ammunition.[411] Finding himself in desperate straits he sent envoys to Constantinople to offer to pay the tribute once more and ask for a fifteen years’ truce. Mohammed granted this request, fully intending to attack Bosnia at once. The Servian Michael of Ostrovica, who heard the Sultan discussing this treachery, warned the Bosnian ambassadors, but they laughed at him and returned home with the good news. Mohammed then began his northward march with 15,000 horse and countless foot, and let out that he intended to attack Hungary itself, so that Matthew Corvinus should not send help to Bosnia. The army marched through Üsküb to Senice, and an advanced guard under Mohammed Pasha captured Podrinje in Bosnia. The great fortress of Bobovac, which had hitherto resisted all Turkish sieges, was next attacked. It might easily have held out for many months, but the Governor, Knez Radak, a Bogomil who had been converted to Catholicism by force, surrendered it without a struggle. The traitor, however, was beheaded by the Turks, and a large part of the inhabitants made prisoners, including the very envoys who had brought the charter of the truce from Constantinople. The news of the fall of Bobovac caused the most widespread dismay throughout the land, and the Turkish advance was almost unopposed, many of the Bogomil nobles going over to the enemy. In eight days about eighty towns had surrendered. The King fled from Jajce to Kljuć, where he was pursued by Mohammed Pasha and besieged. On a promise that his life would be spared if he surrendered, he gave himself up, and was brought as a prisoner before the Sultan at Jajce, which had also opened its gates to him on the understanding that its inhabitants should be unmolested. The craven King helped to make the conquest all the easier by authorising his governors and officers to surrender (June 1463). The Sultan now wished to complete his conquests by annexing the Herzegovina. Stephen Kosača at first meditated flight to Ragusa, but then determined to hold out for a time, and sent his son, Vladislav, to levy troops on the coast. The Turkish advance through the bare and rocky Karst mountains of the Duchy proved more difficult than was anticipated. Mohammed besieged Blagaj, the Duke’s residence, in vain, captured Kljuć (not the Bosnian town of that name) and Ljubuski, but soon lost them again.[412] A few weeks later he abandoned the scheme and returned to Constantinople. The Bosnian kingdom had collapsed entirely; 100,000 prisoners had been taken, and 30,000 youths enrolled in the corps of Janissaries. The Sultan was in doubt as to what to do with Stephen Tomašević. It was his invariable practice to put the rulers of the lands which he conquered to death, but in this case his lieutenant had pledged the Imperial word that the King should be spared. A learned Persian mufti helped him out of the difficulty by declaring that a safe-conduct given without the Sultan’s direct assent to be invalid, and he himself cut off Stephen’s head. The King’s widow, Mary Helena, fled to Croatia and afterwards to Spalato, accompanied by many magnates, including the Vojvod Ivaniš Vlatković, and eventually died in Hungary. The Queen-mother, Catherine, lingered for a while in the convent of Sutjeska (Herzegovina), until the advance of the Turks forced her to escape by way of Stagno to Ragusa, where she received hospitality and was given a pension of 500 ducats a year. She remained there until 1475, when she retired to a convent in Rome; she died in the Eternal City three years later, and was buried in the church of Ara Cœli.
Countless fugitives from Bosnia now fled to the Dalmatian towns, especially to the ever-hospitable Ragusa, until at last Mohammed’s attention was called by a Franciscan monk to the depopulation of the country, and he was induced to modify his policy of persecution and grant privileges to that Order, which thenceforth ministered to the spiritual needs of the Bosnian Catholics.[413] Religious differences had thus brought about the final ruin of the land, and subjected it to the awful blight of Turkish misrule for over four centuries; but they survived the conquest. The Bogomils gradually dropped into Muhamedanism, which from its purely monotheistic character was less repugnant to them than Catholicism; but a few adhered to their old tenets for a long time, and there were Bogomils in Bosnia and the Herzegovina until sixty or seventy years ago; indeed it is asserted that Bogomil rites are still practised by the Muhamedans of certain villages near Konjica and elsewhere. The Orthodox Church, however, gained large numbers of adherents, and is to-day the most numerous of the three communities in Bosnia and the Herzegovina.
Meanwhile the Ragusans were cowering behind their walls, expecting every moment to hear the tramp of the Turkish legions advancing to overwhelm them. The outworks on the Monte Sergio were strengthened, the churches outside the city and the houses in the suburbs of Pille and Ploće were pulled down, the wells at Ombla, Gravosa, and the neighbourhood poisoned, and the Government was authorised to destroy the aqueduct if necessary. The fortifications of Stagno were improved, and the Count entrusted with the defence of the frontier. All the Ragusan galleys in Dalmatia and elsewhere were recalled to defend the home waters, crossbowmen and rowers were levied in all the islands, a corps of infantry and lances raised in Apulia and placed under the command of Spirito d’Altamura, and a Herzegovinian contingent under Ivaniš Vlatković was formed. A loan of 15,000 ducats was raised to provide for war expenses.[414] During his raid through the Duchy the Sultan came very near to Ragusa, which he had determined to attack in person and occupy, as it would be a most useful port on the Adriatic and a basis for operations against Venice and Italy. While processions and prayers of intercession were being held in the town, a messenger arrived from the Beglerbeg of Rumelia ordering the Republic to do homage to Mohammed. This was done; but the Sultan demanded that the citizens should give up all their territory to him, and that the ambassadors should follow him to Thrace as hostages. The Senate was filled with consternation, as the surrender of the territory would be but a preliminary to the capture of the city itself. But one of the Senators, Serafino Bona, proposed that a reply should be drafted to the effect that while the Republic was ready to give up its territory to the Turks, it would place the city itself under the direct protection of Hungary and admit a Hungarian garrison. This diplomatic answer saved the situation, for the Sultan, who had heard of the great preparations which were being made in Hungary, had no mind to be attacked by the enemy from the south-west as well as from the north. Moreover, his troops were being severely handled in the rocky gorges of the Herzegovina by Kosača and his mountaineers; so he abandoned the enterprise for the time being.[415]
In the south a vigorous resistance was maintained by Skanderbeg,[416] the only Christian leader worthy of the name since the death of Hunyadi. Captured by the Turks when a child and brought up as a Muhamedan in the corps of Janissaries, he distinguished himself by his prowess in the Turkish service. But during the Servian campaign of 1442 he was suddenly inspired with a feeling of duty towards his native country and the faith of his ancestors. He abandoned the Turkish host with 300 followers, obtained possession of the fortress of Kroia by stratagem, and from that day forth maintained in the wild fastnesses of Albania a desperate and successful struggle against the Turks. Only once was he defeated (in 1456); but on countless other occasions he inflicted overwhelming defeats on the enemy, and he came to be regarded as the chief bulwark of Christianity in the Balkans, assuming the title of “Athleta Christianitatis.” In 1444 he summoned a council of Albanian leaders at the Venetian town of Alessio to concert defensive measures. Army after army was hurled against him, only to be repulsed and cut to pieces. After the capture of Constantinople Mohammed sent Hamsa Pasha with 50,000 men into Albania, but he was defeated by Skanderbeg with only 11,000. A few months later the Albanian hero passed through Ragusa on his way to Apulia to obtain help from Alfonso V., King of Naples, and having received promises of a contingent of Neapolitan troops, he returned in disguise to Ragusa, when he was given a ship to go to Redoni in Albania. According to Razzi,[417] the Sultan heard of this visit and raised the Ragusan tribute in consequence. The Neapolitan historian Summonte, on the other hand, states that Skanderbeg himself did not come to Naples on this occasion, but sent three ambassadors. He adds that Albania was then placed under Neapolitan protection. What is certain, however, is that 1000 men and 18 guns were sent from Naples to the Athlete of Christendom. In 1458 Alfonso died, and his son Ferdinand found his succession disputed by John of Anjou, who had the support of most of the barons. He then appealed to Skanderbeg for help, and the chivalrous Albanian, who was not forgetful of past services, being at the time undisturbed by the Turks, crossed over to Apulia in 1459, defeated Ferdinand’s enemies, established the King securely on the throne, and returned to Albania the following year. Ragusa again furnished him with money and arms, recommended his cause to the Pope, and gave him ships for service along the coast and between Albania and Italy. It is probable that all his sea journeys as well as those of his ambassadors were performed on Ragusan ships. He also deposited sums of money in the treasury of the Republic. Between 1460 and 1461 he defeated four Turkish armies of 300,000 or 400,000 men each, and obliged Mohammed to make peace with him. Early in 1462 he again visited Ragusa, where he was greatly honoured by the citizens, and furnished with further supplies of grain, wine, sheep, &c. When, in 1463, Pope Pius II. proclaimed a crusade, Skanderbeg was induced to violate the truce—as indeed Mohammed would have done had it suited him—and joined the expedition. On August 4, 1464, he gained a splendid victory at Ochrida, but twelve days later Pius II. died, and the crusade collapsed, and Skanderbeg found himself alone, exposed to the full fury of the Turks. But he again routed them, and sent envoys to Italy to ask for assistance. Mohammed in person led a large army into Albania and laid siege to Kroia. Skanderbeg remained outside the town, as he had done in the previous siege, with a few thousand warriors, and repeatedly fell upon the enemy, inflicting heavy losses on them. Mohammed, hearing that his northern frontiers were threatened by the King of Hungary, and his Asiatic provinces by the Prince of Caramania, departed from Albania, leaving Balaban Pasha to continue the siege with 19,000 men (he had lost 30,000 already). Skanderbeg himself went to Rome to obtain further help from the Powers. But although he was received with great splendour, he obtained no material assistance save a little money. Venice, however, sent him some troops, and on the death of Balaban Pasha the siege of Kroia was raised. In 1466 the Sultan returned in person with 130,000 men to attack Durazzo and Kroia, but failed in both attempts, and returned discomfited to Constantinople. Further contingents arrived from Venice and Naples, and Skanderbeg summoned another conference of chiefs at Alessio to discuss defensive measures. But on January 17, 1467, the Athlete of Christendom died of fever. The Persian war continued to give the Albanians a short respite, but the end of their independence was not far off. Skanderbeg had not had time to consolidate his country so that it would remain united after his death, and his disappearance was followed by complete anarchy.
